Russian invasion of Ukraine

[Todd_is_God]

5 minutes ago, San Starko Rover said:

Well no matter who did what let’s just hope we can calm this whole thing down in the near future as the alternative of a full war in Europe again doesn’t bear thinking about. 

The window of opportunity for calming it down was back in February / March. The West chose aggression instead.

[San Starko Rover]

1 minute ago, Todd_is_God said:

The window of opportunity for calming it down was back in February / March. The West chose aggression instead.

What was the alternative, let them take Ukraine? 

[jagfox]

2 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

So the Russian end game is to use nuclear weapons on its neighbour to invite a nuclear strike on itself and then not retaliate?

Ludicrous.

I also don't believe that Russia using nuclear weapons in Ukraine would lead to NATO using nuclear weapons in response either.

Hopefully you are right. Bottom line is nobody knows for sure.

 

[Dev]

I sense that Putin and his backers are driving a huge wedge between themselves and the ordinary Russian folk. He's already arming 100k of innocent Russians. He's being said to be pouring 20k of them into Belarus. That would draw Belarus directly into the conflict. It adjoins the EU and, inevitably, this would not be tolerated by the EU. It would also over-extend Russian capabilities in terms of conventional warfare. Bye Bye Lukashenko.

Presumably the remainder of the 100k will be spread around the Russian front-lines against the Ukraine forces. Sounds like a good way to organise a mass confrontation with armed motivated men who do not wish to die and who are behind your own lines. They're the ones whose families and friends will be at the receiving end of huge suffering if they end up being taken home in body bags and they, in turn, won't be content. No wonder non Russian peoples are being heavily targeted. The relatively prosperous White Russians wouldn't put up with it.

Who-ever is responsible for the damage to the Nord pipelines the likes of Putin and his backers are going to be the ones blamed by the EU and the USA, and they, not anyone-else, are who matter. This is the ultimate excuse for an overwhelming joint EU and USA response - although this may not be sudden and could take years but Russia will be economically strangled and even the prosperous Russians will feel the pain. 

In the mean-time Putin and Co continue to over-ride their own military's decision making. Whilst the military is performing below par for the course the Leaders are low in experience and are tone deaf to advice. This is another potential fault-line.

In the mean-time, while Putin continues with the Nuclear Threat (using it as a smoke-screen) he plans to more or less encircle Ukraine, i.e. apart from the west, in a giant pincer movement dependent on huge numbers of volunteers to overwhelm the Ukrainians. However, the volunteers, in the main, don't want to be there. If this route is followed then there will be no alternative but for EU/USA to go the whole hog and force Putin to go nuclear or back down. 

Edited September 29, 2022 by Dev
.

[Dev]

9 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

The window of opportunity for calming it down was back in February / March. The West chose aggression instead.

What is your Stage Name?

[welshbairn]

Most of the Putinistas on here were saying Putin would never be daft enough to invade Ukraine back in January/February. The military exercises around its borders had been planned months before, nothing happening here chaps. Then the cheeky Ukrainians decided to protect their capital and it all went downhill. Definitely the West's fault, obviously. 

[Wee Bully]

19 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

The window of opportunity for calming it down was back in February / March. The West chose aggression instead.*

*Russian State Media

Are you George Galloway?

[LongTimeLurker]

1 hour ago, welshbairn said:

...Germany is never going to allow itself to be dependent on Russia again,...

Really? They kept going on Nordstream II after Crimea had been illegally annexed and most of the Donbas coalfield occupied to form the DNR and LNR knowing full well that the rationale behind it was to cut Poland and Ukraine out of the equation completely as transit states for natural gas. Poland and the Baltic states told them for years that what they were doing was crazy and pleaded with them not to go ahead. When the war was just about to start RAF flights to give the Ukrainians the weapons they needed were not being given permission to cross German airspace. If Kyiv had fallen in three days what do you think would have happened with Nordstream?

[San Starko Rover]

10 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Most of the Putinistas on here were saying Putin would never be daft enough to invade Ukraine back in January/February. The military exercises around its borders had been planned months before, nothing happening here chaps. Then the cheeky Ukrainians decided to protect their capital and it all went downhill. Definitely the West's fault, obviously. 

Putin only respects strength if anything the big mistake was not standing up to him back when he attacked Georgia and certainly not doing it back in 2016. Appeasement with Putin would be a waste of time. Unfortunately he’s now backed into a corner and his next move is anyone guess. Best case is he escalates (mobolisation) to then deesculate to try and save face. 

[Todd_is_God]

28 minutes ago, San Starko Rover said:

What was the alternative, let them take Ukraine? 

Well the total / partial loss of Ukrainian sovereignty is a far preferable outcome to the world being engulfed in a nuclear war, yes, but that wasn't where I was going with that.

You made the point that you hoped the situation could be calmed down soon. All I said was that the window of opportunity for that to happen is long gone.

Looking at the current state of play, how do you see this situation being calmed down?

 

[Todd_is_God]

11 minutes ago, Wee Bully said:

*Russian State Media

Are you George Galloway?

What is incorrect with that statement?

[DiegoDiego]

Putin only respects strength if anything the big mistake was not standing up to him back when he attacked Georgia and certainly not doing it back in 2016. Appeasement with Putin would be a waste of time. Unfortunately he’s now backed into a corner and his next move is anyone guess. Best case is he escalates (mobolisation) to then deesculate to try and save face. 

Georgia pretty much brought that one on themselves. No chance we were getting involved.

[San Starko Rover]

1 minute ago, Todd_is_God said:

Well the total / partial loss of Ukrainian sovereignty is a far preferable outcome to the world being engulfed in a nuclear war, yes, but that wasn't where I was going with that.

You made the point that you hoped the situation could be calmed down soon. All I said was that the window of opportunity for that to happen is long gone.

Looking at the current state of play, how do you see this situation being calmed down?

 

I think Putin will escalate by mobilising and then try to bring Zelenski to the negotiating table and try to get a deal where he gives back some territory in exchange for keeping some. I don’t think it’ll work and Ukrainians will refuse his offer. What happens after that could go many ways from a full war to the Russians turning on him. 

[welshbairn]

3 minutes ago, San Starko Rover said:

Putin only respects strength if anything the big mistake was not standing up to him back when he attacked Georgia and certainly not doing it back in 2016. Appeasement with Putin would be a waste of time. Unfortunately he’s now backed into a corner and his next move is anyone guess. Best case is he escalates (mobolisation) to then deesculate to try and save face. 

If he'd gone full in on the Donbas in 2014 and taken them into the Russian Empire along with Crimea, I doubt if the sanctions would have been any stiffer. The Ukrainian army was as bad as the Russians back then, it would have been a doddle. I think the only reason he didn't was he was so chuffed with himself for taking Crimea with barely a bullet fired. A more bloody takeover of Donbas would have spoilt the thrill of the master strategist. 

[welshbairn]

6 minutes ago, DiegoDiego said:

14 minutes ago, San Starko Rover said:

Putin only respects strength if anything the big mistake was not standing up to him back when he attacked Georgia and certainly not doing it back in 2016. Appeasement with Putin would be a waste of time. Unfortunately he’s now backed into a corner and his next move is anyone guess. Best case is he escalates (mobolisation) to then deesculate to try and save face. 

Georgia pretty much brought that one on themselves. No chance we were getting involved.

Absolutely, Saakashvili was a fool, Russia played him like a toy. 

[Newbornbairn]

2 hours ago, Elixir said:

I wish Detournement would just tell us all what is happening and how it ends - saves us all the bother, imo.

He has to wait for his handler's instructions

[Newbornbairn]

 

[dorlomin]

Putin was giving it "the good Czar betrayed by the corrupt and incompetent Boyars" on TV today over the mobilisation and its failingshe was promising that those too old or in the wrong jobs would be withdrawn and blaming it on bad local officials. But anyway, I expect two outcomes from tomorrows announcement of the annexations. One the conscripts will be deployed to the war zone, I would expect them to be sent to beef up existing formations but any plan that involves logic, reason and common sense is likely asking too much from Russia. 

The second response will be in the US and will be to push to release the old M1A1s and M1A2s in storage to Ukraine. The big constraint will be training maintenance crews as 65 tonnes of metal does take a lot of specialised maintenance. But we have been feeding them niche weapons systems not our main armour killers (Apache, Abrams A-10). Fed fiscal year starts on 1st October, but I do not think that will be significant. 

 

[Todd_is_God]

1 hour ago, San Starko Rover said:

I think Putin will escalate by mobilising and then try to bring Zelenski to the negotiating table and try to get a deal where he gives back some territory in exchange for keeping some. I don’t think it’ll work and Ukrainians will refuse his offer. What happens after that could go many ways from a full war to the Russians turning on him. 

Like I said earlier the window of opportunity for a deal is long gone. This now ends only with Ukraine pushing Russian forces out of Ukraine altogether, or Russia somehow regaining momentum and taking all of Ukraine.

You have to assume The West will have anticipated how a nuclear superpower might react when faced with an embarassing defeat in a war involving it's own borders when they made the decision to engage in economic warfare with it and came to the conclusion they'd quietly slink away.

I guess at some point we will find out if they were right.

[dorlomin]

Russian milbloggers now saying Lyman is cut off. (Wargonzo and Rybar).